• Tshwane Library and Information Service, Pretoria, South Africa
  
  

Precious Ramotswe, that cheerful Botswanan private investigator of the best-selling No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency series, is now married to Mr J.L.B. Matekoni, of Tlokweng Road Speedy Motors. The Agency is busy, but Mma Ramotswe cannot ignore the plea which is made to her by a woman who comes to her with a tale of particular misfortune. Unfortunately, her attempts to help are interrupted by a close encounter between her tiny white van and a bicycle, and by a spectacular disagreement between her assistant, Mma Makutsi, and one of the apprentices at the garage. This apprentice has found a fancy girlfriend who drives a large silver Mercedes-Benz. How can he be rescued from his folly? And as for Mma Makutsi, she has found a dancing class, and a man who may not be able to dance very well but who admires her greatly. And all of this happens against a background of quiet sessions of bush tea, and of a land that stretches out forever under mile upon mile of empty sky.

Both entertaining and moving, In the Company of Cheerful Ladies is another masterpiece of comic understatement from Alexander McCall Smith and an affectionate homage to Botswana and its people.

Alexander McCall Smith is an internationally-known Professor of Medical Law, vice-chairman of the Human Genetics Commission for the UK, and a member of the International Bioethics Commission of UNESCO. He is the author of more than fifty titles ranging from reference works to children's titles, including the hugely popular The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series. Born in Zimbabwe and educated there and in Scotland, he now lives in Edinburgh.